Self portait on a sunny afternoon
I’ve heard it said that “The Terrible Two’s” is a myth and that really, what’s terrible are the threes. Ruby won’t be three for another month but I see what’s ahead because ahead has already mowed me down. Sometime during the last week, my beautiful, darling daughter was snatched up and replaced by a person who looks, sounds and smells exactly like her, but who is, I’ve decided, the child of Satan.
In the past two days alone, I’ve been bitten, scratched, kicked, slapped and punched (twice in the eye and once in public). I’ve been growled at, sneered at, glared at, spit on and stomped away from. I’ve had pee wiped on my jeans with small brown hands while large brown eyes promised it wasn’t urine.
I’d like to say that I handled these moments with calmness and maturity but that would be a lie almost as big as the anger I’m forced to wrestle with given the circumstances. The first few incidents I dealt with well enough; I instantly deferred to the father and walked away. Really pissed off and hyperventilating, but I did walk away. The most recent incidents, however…well. I lost my shit, which I may write more about later.
Shortly after the changeling awoke for her eighth or ninth time last night (I lost count), I told Sam that I wanted out, that I’m just a ghost in our lives anyway, that I wanted to get my own apartment. Of course, it doesn’t matter where I go because as a friend told me once, wherever I go, there I am. I could move down the street or across the Atlantic and there I would be, alone with myself. Well, probably not alone. I have a feeling that Guilt and Remorse would be keeping me company.
The thing is, there are few situations in life from which we cannot extricate ourselves: You’re unhappy in your marriage, you get a divorce. You don’t like your job, you get a new one. Aren’t crazy about the town in which you live, you move on. But once you’re a parent, you’re always a parent. It’s irrevocable. And nearly unbearable when you can’t stand your child.
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